“And he is uncle of this young lady, Elma Heath?”

“Uncle?  Ah!  I don’t know that, m’sieur.  I have never been told so.  His niece—­poor young lady!—­can that be?  Surely not!”

“Why not?” I asked.

But the woman gave me no reason; she only exhibited her palms and sighed.  She seemed to have compassion upon the girl I sought; her heart was really softer than I had believed it to be.

“Where does this Baron live?” I asked, surprised that he should occupy so high a place in Russian officialdom—­the representative of the Czar, with powers as great as the Emperor himself.

“At the Government Palace, in Helsingfors.”

“And Elma Heath is here—­in this grim fortress!  Why?”

“Ah, m’sieur, how can I tell?  By reason of family secrets, perhaps.  They account for so much, you know.”

“That is exactly my opinion,” I said.  “She has been brought here against her will.”

“Most probably.  This is not a cheerful place, as you see.  We have five months of ice and snow, and for four months are practically cut off from civilization and see no new face.”

“Terrible!” I gasped, glancing round at those dark stone walls that seemed to breathe an air of tragedy and mystery.  The old castle had, I supposed, been turned into a convent, as many have been in Germany and Austria.  Back in feudal times it no doubt had been a grand old place.  “And have you been here long?” I asked.

“Seven years only.  But I am leaving.  Even I, used as I am to a solitary life, can stand it no longer.  I feel that its cold silence and dreariness will drive me mad.  In winter the place is like an ice-well.”

The fact that the Baron was ruler of Finland amazed me, for I had half-expected him to be some clever adventurer.  Yet as the events of the past flashed through my brain, I recollected that in Rannoch Wood had been found the miniature of the Russian Order of Saint Anne, a distinction which, in all probability, had been conferred upon him.  If so, the coincidence, to say the least, was a remarkable one.  I questioned my companion further regarding the Baron.

“Ah, m’sieur,” she declared, “they call him ’The Strangler of the Finns,’ It was he who ordered the peasants of Kasko to be flogged until four of them died—­and the Czar gave him the Star of White Eagle for it—­he who suppressed half the newspapers and put eighteen editors in prison for publishing a report of a meeting of the Swedes in Helsingfors; he who encourages corruption and bribery among the officials for the furtherance of Russian interests; he who has ordered Russian to be the official language, who has restricted public education, who has overtaxed and ground down the people until now the mine is laid, and Finland is ready for open revolt.  The prisons are filled with the innocent; women are flogged; the poor are starving, and ‘The Strangler,’ as they call him, reports to the Czar that Finland is submissive and is Russianized!”